A Rational Chemical Synthesis of C60
Abstract
Isolable quantities of C60, the smallest stable fullerene, have been synthesized in 12 steps from commercially available starting materials by rational chemical methods. A molecular polycyclic aromatic precursor bearing chlorine substituents at key positions forms C60 when subjected to flash vacuum pyrolysis at 1100°C. No other fullerenes are formed as by-products. The methods we have developed for the target-specific synthesis of fullerenes, applied here to a synthesis of C60, should make possible the directed laboratory preparation of other fullerenes as well, including those not accessible by graphite vaporization.
- Publication:
-
Science
- Pub Date:
- February 2002
- DOI:
- 10.1126/science.1068427
- Bibcode:
- 2002Sci...295.1500S
- Keywords:
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- CHEMISTRY